The Dyslexic Author (by sarah)

This week is Dyslexia Awareness Week, it is also the begininng of an insane writing challenge called NaNoWriMo which stands for National Novel Writing Month. The idea is that you write a minimum of fifty thousand words in a month and I have been doing this challenge and a picture book sister challenge called PiBoIdMo (Picture Book Idea Month) since 2009, which is now scary long ago.

When I first started the challenge and using the forum I felt very edgy, being severely dyslexic made me hesitate to enter into online written discussions with grammarian monsters - the sort that correct friends' emails. How was I ever going to compare to such writing experts when sometimes I can't spell mine or my kids' names correctly?

Trying to belt out a novel is an amazing experience but it is also an emotionally fraught one, especially for those low on self confidence. Self confidence is a key to success - it is not the only key but it is one of the main three - Self Confidence, Endurance and Improvisation/Adaptability. Dyslexics, due to our education system and social attitudes, tend to be high on intelligence and low on that whole confidence thing. To keep going with the writing you kind of need to believe that your story is good enough, that your imagination is fantastic and that everyone is going to want to read it. Many authors go through a cycle of thinking their stuff is amazing and will win a nobel prize, to sinking into a pit of despair over how rubbish it is.

But dyslexics have an added edge of nerves, an extra question over their abilities. Not only is there the language structure issues but there is the widely held idea that if you cannot spell you cannot write. This is wrong.

And it turned out that the way NaNoWriMo works is fantastic for boosting dyslexic writers. It goes something like this - everyone is rushing to get down as many words as they can, you are encouraged to leave the typos as they are and just keep going, everyone has typos, inversions of letters, missed letter where they are just typing so fast. Normal people see these and correct them, the dyslexic brain may think that that is the correct spelling and at other times it will see it as wrong - but conversely it might see the correct spelling as wrong and correct it to something incorrect - DOH!

What this means though is that when you are sitting in a cafe or pub with a group of writers your red line squiggles are no longer an issue - everyone has them. Then there is the concept that you can edit a book with mistakes in, no matter how many mistakes there are, but if there is no book to begin with you cannot edit it into something. This frees you up to write.

One of the things I also found was that increasingly I was learning language intricacies and histories and that I could grab the grammar nazis by the proverbial and correct them if and when they started. Grammar is not a fixed thing - look at the history of writing and you find that Shakespeare couldn't spell his own name, that names themselves are pretty fluid, that grammar is just basically a mark up language to tell the reader when to breathe when talking out loud.

But can a dyslexic ever be a writer, be a published author, a journalist?

Yes, they can, and when they do they tend to be multi-genre writers, not brilliant for becoming a household name but good for writing how-to and last minute books, to be able to switch the brain from science to sports to craft, to be journalists (with patient editors!), to be non-specialist all round jacks of all trades. And, increasingly, this is becoming acceptable back in the realm of fiction, thanks to authors such as Neil Gaiman.

So where does that leave me? I have said repeatedly that I must be insane trying to be a writer whilst being very very badly dyslexic but, you know what, I wasn't - I find that being dyslexic helps with research for stories and articles, as I can't rely on words or even the grammar. I often have to use both plus the context, meaning that I can often pick up on the big or small picture, the hidden concepts and deeper meanings. It also stops me making stupid assumptions as I can't take the writing literally and if it doesn't seem right I am forced to ask, to check. For science writing this is extremely important.

Now before we go any further, dyslexia is not something I can really define; it is just a part of how my brain is wired so I will not say that my writing success is because of, nor in spite of, the dyslexia. It could have stopped me; it was a hurdle, and it has stopped many but mainly because they are told they can't do things because of it. Also, yes, I am contrary and stubborn so when people told me I could not, or that I would find stuff hard, I was determined to show them I could do it - especially when my intelligence itself was under attack.

But would my life achievements have been different without the dyslexia? I kind of think not, I just had to take a different path. And that path has been strange and winding and this last week I have found myself writing craft workshops, reading my kids poetry and stories to kids whilst dressed up in ridiculous outfits at various kid clubs, being asked to perform my page poetry at several events, asked to run writing days for adults and kids, getting sci-fi stories accepted, writing blog copy and presenting my project Cuddly Science which includes script writing and picture book writing and report writing and talk writing.

And that was just this week. This last month included articles on sci-fi/fantasy and science and crafts and gardening and grant applications, and this last year saw me become a member of the Poetry Society, British Science Fiction Association and the British Science Writers Association (and yes that does confuse me especially as there is also the British Hen Well-Fare Trust that we got the chickens from too!), I have been asked to present awards to school kids and I completed a Science Communication course - something I dismissed as a "can't" during my undergraduate degree, due to the dyslexic issues.

I now firmly place myself in the role of writer, of author and so do others. I am finally what I was told I could never be - a dyslexic author. It was not trial free and it is not yet over, it kind of will never be over and I'm ok with that.

Back to NaNoWriMo, I find myself actively encouraging dyslexics to write - to take part and I love wondering around the forums and Facebook pages and twitter seeing articles like this pop up and I love to be able to say to those who are worried, those who are struggling, don't give up, you can succeed at this. And that doesn't just go for writing, it goes for every aspect of career and life 😀

Dads & Lads (by alaric)

popped up in my local news today: Lads and Dads Club to strengthen family unit.

"That sounds a bit... 'last century'", thought I. What activities might require male-only participation? Getting women pregnant probably isn't a task that fathers and sons would traditionally share, so it pretty much had to either be mustache/beard management or targetted urination, right?

But, no, it's a club for doing outdoorsy/adventurous activities. Exactly the kinds of things my wife and eldest daughter enjoy doing, as it happens (our youngest daughter, on the other hand, is scared of mud and trees). So, why the "father/son" branding?

Well, what I suspect they're trying to do is to give fathers motivation and opportunities to spend more time with their children. With the kinds of careers that make the money required to raise a family still much more accessible to men than women, a lot of kids are largely being raised by their mothers, which will indeed give kids a skewed view of the world. For a start, it'll tell them that parenting and domestic chores are for women while going afar and earning money is for men, which sucks. And it'll tell young boys that their destiny is to grow up to be a distant wage-earner, while girls are told that their destiny is to be a carer who's always hanging around the home and spending somebody else's money.

Yep... That sucks. Fathers spending more time with their kids is a good thing, and help in doing that - in telling them that they should, and that it's an OK thing for a man to do, and in giving them ready-made group activities to turn up so they don't need to organise stuff themselves, and to get them in with other similarly-minded people to exchange tips and make friends - sounds awesome to me.

However, I think it's been unfortunately tainted with gender stereotyping. That it's sons that need more time with their fathers, but daughters don't. There's an assumption that the boys need to learn MAN THINGS from their MAN DADS, while the girls are fine learning woman things from their woman mums.

But kids don't have these gender stereotypes as to what activities they should do, unless we force them onto them. And forcing gender roles onto people causes misery.

The Lads and Dads club have a rather defensive-sounding statement on their site saying that mothers and daughters are welcome too, but the rest of the site is full of statements like:

Lads and Dads Club is about creating fun and inspiring male environments. We’ve got great events for grown-up sons and their fathers, from hill walking to sky diving and weekends away. And because not all sons have a dad around, and not all dads have sons, mums and daughters are welcome too.

Boys need to be boys ... At the core of the Lads and Dads Club we are all about supporting fathers in their efforts help their children to grow and develop and have lots of fun along the way. This necessarily means that we are creating a very male oriented environment and we think that this is a good and necessary thing for Fathers, their Sons and often their Daughters too. (and, at least when I fetched it, the bottom of that page had a big ad for "ItsNotForGirls.com: Men's fashion at its finest")

So they've clearly given some thought to gender issues, but seem a bit confused, as no attempt is made to reconcile "Mums and daughters are welcome" with all the hyping of "male environments".

What's going on here? Did somebody complain about the sexism, maybe citing "discrimination", and they felt compelled to quickly wedge in the statements about accepting girls to avoid "trouble"?

You see, I think that organising outdoorsy/adventure activities for kids is great. And encouraging fathers to take a more active role in raising their children is great and particularly needed, because sexist stereotyping tells men they're supposed to be distant and leave the parenting to the mothers. But restricting this parenting to sons, and using it to reinforce the very gender role assumptions that are the root cause of the problem, isn't exactly the best way of dealing with it.

I'm worried that this thing will succeed, and in doing so reinforce the "men work all day, then go to the pub with their mates to avoid going home to their families, and then hide in their sheds all weekend" stereotypes.

And I'm worried that it'll become the target of feminist anger and be destroyed, leaving all the people behind it feeling angry that women came and destroyed their attempts to build a male-only space, leading them to become men's rights activists and try to fight the feminazi conspiracy, rather than trying to help fathers to do cool stuff with their kids (of all genders).

What would be AWESOME is if they realised that the problem they're seeing (fathers aren't getting to do much parenting, at the cost of both themselves and their kids) is a symptom of false traditional ideas of what gender means, and work to solve the problem in ways that break down those gender models, rather than reinforcing them. Now, to market it to fathers who, themselves, will have been brought up with those kinds of gender stereotypes, they'll need to be careful to make it look acceptably "manly" so that the fathers aren't turned away from it; there's a very fine line between "not offending gender stereotypes" and "promoting gender stereotypes", but it can be walked. The organisation's current description of themselves (starting with the unfortunate name...), however, is nowhere near that line. There's no reason to actually use the word "father", rather than "parent"; if the content is all written without touching on gender stereotypes of any kind, it can be "not unfatherly" without being "exclusively fatherly" (and, therefore, "not unmotherly" without being "exclusively motherly" either!).

The United Kingdom is full of "mother and toddler" groups. Even if they're called "parent and toddler" instead, they're invariably female-dominated, which reinforces itself as fathers are left feeling quite out of place at them. It would be great to fix that, and a logical place to start is by making "father and child" groups for various age groups of child, so fathers at least have a comfortable place to share fatherhood with each other. Given a chance to build their confidence in that role, we would be able to break down the barriers and migrate towards everything truly being "parent and toddler"; but as with whenever we apply "positive discrimination" to try and encourage people to do something society historically tells them they shouldn't, this needs to be handled with utmost care and sensitivity, lest it becoming divisive and discriminatory in its own right.

This can happen alongside "adventure activities for kids" groups that encourage mothers and fathers to go and do fun stuff with their sons and daughters - which would start off being dominated by fathers and sons, because of our social expectations; but there's no reason to give into that and assume it's the natural state of affairs.

We're all suffering because of gender stereotyping. There's no reason to force that onto another generation.

Cuddly Science at The British Science Festival (by sarah)

Photo thanks to Fiona Austen

The weekend saw me, Alaric and Jean at the British Science Festival in Birmingham. I was doing the most indepth version of Cuddly Science yet - everyone who knows me will no doubt now be sick of hearing about Cuddly Science but just incase here is the run down 🙂

I came up with an idea during my science communication course at UWE and have spent the last six months working on it, initially just as a piece of course work but I soon realised that this was the thing that would link together all my skill sets. It grew and adapted.

It is a set of puppets, larger than life versions of influential scientists, technologist, engineers, maths peeps and medical persons. Initially I focused on Ada - she was a natural choice as we have taken part in every single Ada Lovelace Day so far!

Ada went on a few trips out and about telling kids about programming computers and her own erratic childhood. But right from the beginning I knew this needed to be bigger, I have a list of puppets that need to be made.

I now have 5 puppets, I only actually had two proper shows prepared for the Science Festival as I'd planned to repeat one of them. But people decided that they were going to keep coming back to my next show so I improvised the last show which was more about the experiments and science games we'd sorted out.

As mostly Cuddly Science is just me, each puppet has their own show with an activity of some sort for the kids to take part in. So Darwin told of how he wasn't very good at school or sitting still and about his discoveries and this led onto DNA (which wasn't about in his day!). We then did a little DNA extraction experiment with the kids which they loved.

Ada has a game that Alaric designed and I have done the graphics for, called Robo Bob's Jobs. We want to make a giant version of it as too our amazement there were way more than the 30 people we had designed our shows around and we need something seen from the back etc. The size of the crowed and the increase in business of the library during the day caused some issues with noise levels so I want to get a portable PA system as well. I need funding.

We also had some bits from Universe in a Box which the kids loved and was the stage for Brahmagupta, a 1500 yr old maths and astronomy dude. I generally entertained the kids between shows with the puppets and also during the activity sessions. We also had colouring sheets which I had drawn - manga scientists with room for the older kids to write down little factoids about the scientists etc...

I want to draw some more of these and maybe have a proper bundle for people to take away with them or down load from the web etc...

There were also science crayons for the colouring in - it was very popular and parents were desperate for their kids to have one of each of the pictures.

Those who could here the shows seemed to really enjoy them and I had so many people coming up to me to say how brilliant it was, how the children really responded to the puppets etc... I did get very nervous for the Ada show which was strange as I have done that one several times before. There were a lot of people there but not as many as for the last show which was improvised so should have been more nerve racking!

This is why I am off to do an improve comedy course at the end of the month - I am going to nail those nerves!

The appeal of the puppets was pretty universal and I got people who were just in the library and hoping for a story time - I equipped them with programmes for the rest of the festival and some of the kids would have played Al's game for hours and hours and had to be shoed away by Ada Puppet.

Ada was termed a princess by many and at least one parent turn round and said that they hadn't known girls could programme. I obviously thought about all of this when deciding what puppets to put in but was amazed to see impact straight away. Questions from adults and kids a like - mainly about Ada and Brahmagupta - it was the idea that people like "me" have done big science, tech, etc.... I really did not expect to see it so vividly.

I believe science is for everyone and this has been a big part of wanting to do science communication and the science art and it has made me more resolute and determined that Cuddly Science needs to get out there. It maybe one of my mad hat schemes, it may just be stupid puppets that me and my mum designed and games my husband made and a mish mash of my science education, experience running craft workshops, being in musical theatre, being an artist, poet and childrens instructor. It may have gotten it's inspirations from all over the place but Cuddly Science has the chance to make a difference, to help build a better world.

The library and festival volunteers were amazing at looking after us and a chain of people I know from various things came to see me which was very encouraging 🙂 Jeany loved it, especially when I let her set up the Story Steps at the library!

The library itself was pretty epic! And I loved the fact it was connected to the Theatre with poetry on the doors 🙂

I even bumped into a fellow poet just outside 🙂

And got to go to dinner with friends and meet their little one and stuff.

More photos of Birmingham:

Jean and Alaric found where they had been doing the custard walking 🙂

And so yeah - Cuddly Science is GO!

What’s Acceptable When it Comes to Body Image (by sarah)

This video has been doing the rounds as it's the number one butt on the Internet, apparently. My social media is split between people perving and people being horrified that it exists.

It's Nicki Minaj Anaconda.

Taking the first - well, people will perve, both male and female; desiring or liking the aesthetic is not a problem as long as you don't a) think it gives you a right to the person b) make people feel uncomfortable c) assume that there is nothing else to them other than the physical appearance of their body.

The second one I have far more of an issue with. It is her body, she gets to decide how it is portrayed and to me it is much better to have her at the centre of the music and not a background pump-and-grind for some male lyricist. There is a very real issue with being told you can be a free and empowered woman as long as you conform to a set of behaviours and often this includes losing all sexual characteristics - instead of "sex on your own terms" it becomes "no sex what so ever", or a rather staid version. People are all individuals and as such we are all going to have different wants and tastes - she is expressing herself, it's not hurting anyone.

I'm seeing it argued that it is not good role model material in spite of being about having "curves" (more on this later). But, you know, music is an art form, it is about expression, about conveyance of what the artist wants to get across - now that may be a higher order better world stuff, or it may be a window into their own world and existence, or it maybe be a mood or feeling or story they wish to express - all of these things are equally as valid as another. Saying someone should not write, dance, or sing in a certain way as it isn't good for the kids or middle class sensibilities is censorship.

Censorship is a gag that chokes the creatives and the inventors and the scientists of a culture. Watersheds and age certification are not censorship, nor are warning labels as they act as guidelines and gives adults the choice of material consumption.

Obviously, the internet is still trying to sort this sort of stuff out but that is kind of a separate problem to what I wish to talk about.

You see there is another video about basically exactly the same thing which is considered far more acceptable by many of my friends - thus far I have many seen other women sharing this one:

It's Meghan Trainor All About That Bass

But you know, they are basically the same! The themes of the songs are the same but framed slightly differently, there isn't even that much extra clothing in the second one and the dancing is only a little less... bendy-bumpy. There is swearing in both, bum wiggling and grabbing and tongue in cheek humour in both.

So why is one so much more acceptable?

If I am being cynical, I would say it comes down to fear of the different and sub-cultures. I think this is what is being seen by a lot of people - second video shows an empowered woman being a bit earthy and bold where as the first video is a sexually excessive gang culture bling bint who is hanging it all out.

This is fixed into the concept of our own perceived body images for both women. One is assumed to have body confidence to begin with and therefore flaunting it is tarty, whereas the other is assumed to have low body confidence and so she is being brave and edgy.

Sadly I think there is some racial stereotyping going on here. Both of these videos are so similar that this really shouldn't be an issue at all. They are both going on about how large bums are beautiful.

Apart from the censorship angle there is something else going on here when people say that a piece of music should not have been made (this seems to especially apply to the work of female pop stars who can't win, whatever they do). What you are saying to the artist is, "You do not fit with my view of the world, you are different from me and therefore I wish to pretend you do not exist. You opinions and life views are not valid, you background renders you opinions invalid - you are invalid." Think about that for a moment - no one, dancer, builder, prostitute, doctor, is invalid; they all have feelings and thoughts and lives and ideas to express. They are not somehow less human and need to be hidden away from the "proper" people of the world.

Comments like "It's not even real music" bug me even more - how is it not real music? Again what you are saying is that it does not conform to the narrow range of music that you have been exposed to and/or told is "proper music". Also if it's not your thing then don't seek it out - don't listen to it. This is easier on the net than it ever was with telly - we get to be incredibly selective with our viewing if we wish. Don't like? Don't listen, or seek it out but then don't say it shouldn't exist or should be banned.

Now to the positive role model issue: showing people that they can make a living by dancing scantily clad is not actually an issue - the issue with role models is when that is the only model people are giving. When they are shown that that is the only option for them. And as always - if you think something is a rubbish bit of art, do not spend your energies moaning about it, but create your own, maybe even counter-examples, maybe even become the role model you think is lacking? Help create the diversity so every one sees there are multiple options and do not degrade someone for their life choices.

Right - now to the negative bit. I actually do have issues with both of these videos.

Both of them are about large bottomed girls, about how they are attractive and wonderful and so on. Brilliant - great! Challenge the fashion of beauty but... both of them use the phrase 'skinny bitches' as if women of slighter builds are at fault rather than a fashion industry pushing stuff for their own agendas. Both portray thinner women as "doing it on purpose" as if they are malicious and horrible rather than just naturally being built differently.

This is really really wrong because the truth is that the world isn't split into the fat and thin; it is split into the body confident and the body ashamed. Pretty much if you fall outside of the average zone you get abuse because you are too thin, or too fat or your boobs are too big or you're as flat as an ironing board. And just because people appear confident, it doesn't mean they actually are either; please remember that when you loudly comment about low plunged necklines or knobbly knees etc...

And lastly, because it seems to fit so well, here is my poem about body image that I performed at Pride this year:

Books, e-readers, Libraries and the Cost of Books (by sarah)

In our house we have a library, one room that is mainly devoted to books and reading and writing.

We were very excited that we could do this - there are six floor to ceiling book shelves, a desk, filing cabinet and stationary cupboard with printers and scanners and shredders on top and finally the nursing chair (initially for breast feeding but now just for reading - my teenage cousins call it the BOOOOBY chair). There is also the guitars, ukes and music box.

On the window sill are some salad and chilli plants growing in containers and a few ripening tomatoes. Above them are some lovely sun catchers and photon pump windmill things.

They are not the only book cases in our house - we have another covered with old books on tech and science and comic books and a shelf of my display cabinet with signed copies on and a half height one full of photo albums, cookery, wine making, gardening, first aid, bush craft, comedy and how to look after kids. The girls also have two book cases in their room - one covered in ceramic teddy's and christening gifts with one shelf for the books series Jeany (almost 9) is currently working her way through. The other is almost floor to celling with large bedtime books and small picture books and easy first chapter books through to my collection of Redwall, Phillip Pullman and finally on the top shelf the point horrors and terror accademies etc... The hardness of books increases with the height of the shelf it is on.

We love our library and we love our books - then some one came round the other day and took one look at the library and said, 'what a lot of clutter, you should get a kindle or something then you can get rid of all this and get the space back.'

I tried to explain that we had a kindle and a tablet computer (which was got for me doing my uni course) and that we read stuff on them but that the book collection was still important. They didn't get it - they just saw a waste of space and they are not the first person. Of course it is supposed to be a dinning room and it would be a fab one but we have a "breakfast" room off of the kitchen which mainly fits us - true when my parents visit getting all six of us round the table is interesting but it is doable and in the summer I make us all eat outside anyway and Christmas dinner we set the table up in the living room which is huge (did I mention how we still can't believe we have this house!).

But more over we can not simply replace our book collection with e-readers, about 20% of the books are not in an electronic format, and then some of them are signed copies which have special attachments as I or Alaric or Jean or Mary... have spoken to the author to get the signatures or they are dedicated presents or even dedicated to us (well Alaric anyway), some of them are hand made and are beautiful objects, and some of the books are ours - that we have written, that have been given to us by the publishing companies.

Also one of the shelving units in the library is actually full of workbooks and colouring for the girls, or educational kits people have gotten them or the books they have created in school and pre-school which they like to show relatives (that is the one with everything spilling out on it as Jean has free reign). There are old art mags, National Geographics and New Scientists which I use for collage, decoupage, ideas for stories and for various workshops I run - they can't really go either.

Now when we moved two and a half years we did cull our book collection, a lot of the old computing books and the scifi, fantasy collection - ie out of date tech books or ones where all the info was more upto date on a website and books we had both read and had no want to read again - we had book sales and stuff to raise money for Shelter and we will have others as time goes on (especially as there are still a couple of boxes of left over books in the attic!).

In short we would be perfectly happy to have ebooks of most of the fiction books unless they were really old with 50's covers etc... or signed.

But in truth we could not digitize as much as we actually want. I have a huge range of text books ranging from geology to history to my craft and art books and the ones that you can get electronic - all want the same sort of price I paid for the hard back physical copy that I OWN. On top of that a lot of e-books are only "loaned" to your device due to DRM - the anti-piracy/copying thing. The upshot of this is that to replace those books in ebook format would cost THOUSANDS of pounds and again due to DRM we wouldn't be able to keep back up copies, I find books also corrupt on the e-readers and some times they are actually MORE EXPENSIVE in electronic format than as a physical object.

Also small e-readers are still not really that good for text books with large and complex diagrams as you just can't get enough on the image in a readable manner on the screen. With the larger tablets pictures books are starting to be ok but they still aren't brilliant in electronic format and the danger is the kids will just be sucked into the gaming bit that comes with it. (We like games but I think the looking at the story bit outside of the game is initially important - games are good if it is a complex story that needs a bit more explanation or the kids already know the story really well.)

Recently there has been a big thing between Amazon and Hatchet about this and yes Amazon are a big company trying to make money but so are Hatchet - there are two bad guys in this tail. And though Amazons were acting out of non-alteristic motives they do actually have a point.

e-books really should not be as expensive as physical books. Now the standard cry is that you are buying the content so the format doesn't matter but it very much it does. You die, you get to leave your books to someone - currently you can't do this with electronic format, as I said earlier it is loaned - you do NOT own it.

And the thing is that though the pre-production costs and the marketing costs are the same with both - the writing, editing, type-setting, cover design etc... once in production that changes. With a physical book you have paper and printing costs, transport, checking up on the shops the books are in to make sure they are getting shelf/promotion time, possibly P&P including returns, warehouse storage, often a second lot of transport, risks of water, fire, customer browsing damage - rendering copies not fit for sale. Then if they don't sell you have pulping and shredding and/or more transport with sale or return or putting them in auction for the pound shops.

Of course physical books make books signings easier and get the author out there at book stores and conventions - something that is incredibly important for the no-list and mid-list authors but something that should make the physical book copy the special luxary item.

The post-production costs of e-books on the other hand just kind of aren't - even if you are getting enough downloads to need your own peer to peer connection and dedicated server the costs would still be drastically lower (even with books being printed whole sale and cheap in China - in which case there is the environmental balance of electricity burned by servers and ereaders verses multiple transports and paper and inks and so on).

I know many avid readers who see the cheap 99p ebooks as a cheap sustainable way for them to read and they simply do not buy the more expensive books, there are also whole swaths of free ebooks. Authors like Cory Doctorow give ebooks away and it boosts their sales of their physical books. I myself have found this with The Little Book of Spoogy Poetry. Most of the people who bought a copy of the book had been people who had downloaded it for free the previous year. They knew what was in it, they felt they wanted to invest in getting a physical copy of it.

I have however seen people saying they don't think this works or isn't as effective as people believe, I personally have not been impressed with their reasoning but that doesn't mean they are wrong - this is still a really new area of consumer consumption and none of us really knows what we are doing. And of course then there are people who only produce ebooks and eskew the physical print copies all together - this has grown the erotic fiction writing market drastically as people don't have to worry about those pesky covers giving them away on the train or at lunch time at the office.

But I note that most of them do not charge huge amounts for their ebooks - they are markedly less than physical paper backs.

Of course one of the reasons behind ebooks being able to be cheaper is that more people would be inclined to buy them - this does not always equate with them actually reading the work though and I have seen reports suggesting that more highly priced books are more likely to be read. But for a low end author if only one in say five of the people actually get around to reading you books and only two like it and only one of those tells their friends about you... you are still looking at a good growth potential making the ebooks something that both author and reader can experiment with to see what works/suites them - if they are cheap.

However this model of more sales of ebooks and less over heads making the lower price pay more.... only really works with fiction or high demand books. For specialist publications such as crystallography of man made drain pipes or something where there is not going to be vast numbers of potential readers... it doesn't. These books tend to be heavy on images and often actual images under microscopes and things, all of which cost money. They are often £110 in hard back and large. There are also shipping industry mags and the like that would have similar issues. These types of publications struggle to break even on physical copies and library loans and are often subsidised by other publications done by the same group. I don't know what the answer is for them as students kind of need their text books - maybe libraries? But the loan rates wont pay for the work either.

These books are the outliers though and not the big bulk of books - but the fact that they exist means that though I think ebooks in general should be cheaper than the physical copy, there are exceptions and as such companies like amazon really should not try to dictate what publishers charge for the books - the publishers then being greedy is another issue and one I think that will ultimately cause them problems.

I mentioned libraries in the above - now I don't mean our little one room library but Uni libraries which are epic though have been hit somewhat by various issues meaning that the journal you need isn't getable though of course that is another story.

But what of public libraries?

I hear it said quiet often that libraries are obsolete - that public money shouldn't be poured into them as books are so cheap now and there is the internet. For a start text books or factual books still aren't that cheap and many people still do not have ereaders or smart phones - they are becoming more common but there are still a lot of people without them and that is without taking into account those who will never get to grips with the tech.

Not everybody has a spare 5 or 10 pounds or more to spend on a book, and children can get through a hell of a lot of picture books which if you are in a small house or flat can be come an issue fast. Yes you can pick them up in charity shops but even the charity shops have gotten a bit pricey of late - some want up to up to a fiver for a dog eared picture book which in the cheap shops you can often get for new for the same or slightly below.

Also the internet can be a confusing place - what is correct? Which websites can you trust for information - critical thinking and biases analysis is not a major part of our main stream education. Most people lack the skills to filter the information themselves - most of the people being verbal about this stuff have a good education due to money or the area they were born into and do not see the need for the libraries.

But I have spent a hell of a lot of time in the libraries around Gloucester and Cheltenham now and the libraries are essential. They are places where school kids can go and do homework - and no they can't all do it at home even if there is a computer there. Some of the more well of kids go to the library on the home from school because they're parents govern exactly what information they have access to at home, that doesn't sound to bad until you realise they are not being allowed to look things up for their home work, that they have no privacy and that they can not electronically connect with their peer group at home. This is really a very un good situation and the library offers a safety valve for society in giving these children the chance to still learn. Now obviously they could still use their school library to do this but unless they go to a funky school, the schools resources are likely to be more limited than the large inner city libraries. Also the librarians are a huge help in finding the information you need, weather that be from the internet or from physical books.

Libraries also tend to have all the local history stuff in it, they are warm desk space for students and people who are freelancing and can't yet afford an office space. They have workshops and outreach programmes which have the knock on effect of showing people they can improve themselves and their lot and that is 60% of the battle won.

In my time using the library as warm office space/free child entertainment I have seen illiterate mothers come in and their children learn to read, people who have learnt to read in prison come in and shyly set up their account and then go off to the books that show them how to make things, cook things, create things - this reduces the chances of re-offending drastically and you know if they could have read in the first place, if they hadn't fallen through our societal educational crack, the crimes may never have been committed in the first place.

I've observed those who no longer have care centres to be in sitting in the library all day, drawing child like pictures which takes all their concentration - what would happen to them without the libraries?

The libraries I've been in have been pretty busy most of the time, they are information hubs for local events, groups and businesses, they do tend to have security guards which is sad but needs must and I'd rather that than they just closed down and I certainly don't want groups not let in for dress code or anything.

Of course the ones outside of the city centres have stupid opening times due to cost cutting measures which means they are less used and I am as guilty of this as many - this summer I taking the girls to Gloucester library rather than our nearest as I'm in Glos twice a week anyway and the nearer one is closed so many afternoons a week and that is my preferred library time, it only has one late evening and a half day (morning again) on Saturdays. This is a horrible viscous circle and I can't really see a way out of it for the libraries with all the cuts etc 🙁

Library funding not withstanding I personally think the day of the book is not over, that the electronic revolution will work out as an over all good thing and that will not make libraries obsolete. We love our library and our books and are quite happy with it, we are aware that a lot of people do not read beyond the more dubious parts of the press (pretty much all of it!) and have no critical thinking skills - these can be obtained from reading... oh look cheap e-books... oh look you no longer have to worry about looking nerdy in front of your friends as they think you're just on facebook...

As for our books and library, it is staying and ebook prices need to come down but amazon has no right to dictate the prices companies and/or authors choose and the writers are going to have to be careful not to get caught in the cross fire. Some writing collectives are bypassing publishers and amazon a like - I am watching their progress with interest.

The book market is kind of shrinking and kind of growing at the moment ie it is in flux. Comic books is the only strong growth area for physical hard copy books at the moment - I think the e-zines have helped drastically with this and this is a brilliant thing to happen.

a) comic books are a gateway to chapter book reading

b) many of them are complex, clever stories in their own right and make the reader think

So to sum it all up... long live the book.

p.s. being able to read does not make you intelligent nor wise, it is what you read that is important however not everyone who can not read is stupid or thick or unworldly wise, there are other sources of information imput - reading just helps and is needed to develop certain skills in the majority of people but individuals are individuals and as some one who came late to reading themselves I feel this needs pointing out.